*WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

  Backrooms is exactly what I wanted it to be: a spooky movie with an eerie vibe that doesn’t lean too far into jump scares.

  Released on May 29, it was directed by Kane Parsons, an internet personality who became popular through his found footage style Backrooms shorts on Youtube. Parsons made those in Blender and became incredibly popular. Studio A24 gave Parsons roughly $10 million to make the movie, making him the youngest director in the studio’s history, being only 19 years old when he directed it.

  The whole movie has such a great vibe of eeriness and tension that builds throughout. Clark is a furniture store owner who is also a failed architect and got kicked out of his house by his wife. Mary is Clark’s therapist who has a hard time getting through to Clark and has a lot of childhood trauma of her own, with her mother having been paranoid and abusive to her. When Clark discovers that he can walk through a wall in the basement of his furniture store, he discovers the “Backrooms,” which are office-like spaces that stretch on seemingly forever and include strange and haunting things in each room. Supporting characters Kat and Bobby are Clark’s employees who eventually reluctantly follow him into the Backrooms for research, and Mary eventually goes to find a missing Clark and discovers the Backrooms as well. The characters are fun and interesting, while also not acting in a way that doesn’t make too much sense even when the surroundings feel beyond confusing (besides the scene where Clark randomly runs back into the Backrooms just to steal a stool).

  With Parsons at the helm, there were bound to be found footage scenes. The one scene in particular where Clark is exploring with his employees is one of the highlights of the movie. In it Clark lowers Bobby into a lower area with a ramp leading to it. Down there, there are a bunch of clothes and doors. When Bobby sees something moving, he runs up but is pulled back down, and Clark and Kat are pushed down as well and then run. Clark runs through some rooms, all while still holding the camera, and eventually puts the camera down while still on, which is picked up and turned off by the monster offscreen. The scares are well-crafted and the monster is not seen yet which helps build it up. Clark also runs through a few different rooms that aren’t necessarily different levels, but pay homage to some popular levels in the lore, like the pool rooms. 

  Many people are upset that the movie is “boring” and “didn’t explain anything” about the Backrooms. First of all, the movie is not boring. Anyone who thinks they should’ve gone to see the Mandalorian and Grogu movie for fun explosions and action instead is sorely mistaken. This movie isn’t about cheap moments and loud scares. It’s about the unnerving environment of the Backrooms for most of the movie and the terror of the monsters. Second of all, I love that the movie didn’t explain exactly what the Backrooms are. Fear of the unknown is one of the most important aspects of the Backrooms. Explaining them would have diminished the horror and made them less intriguing. Third of all, Clark does kind of explain them. He says they’re a place that remembers things in the real world, but incorrectly. And the more it remembers, the more it gets wrong. This is an interesting explanation that doesn’t take away from how cool they are.

  My favorite scene in the movie is the “dinner scene” between main characters Clark and Mary where, at this point, Clark has completely lost his mind in the Backrooms having been there so long. He ties Mary up and tries to explain what the Backrooms is in the presence of a few entities. After explaining that they are just thoughtless, feelingless husks, he says the best part about these entities is that “you can eat them.” He then reaches into one of them and pulls out some substance that looks like thick viscous mashed potatoes or grounded up sticky rice. The whole scene, tied together by the actors’ performances, especially the moment where Mary finally stands up to Clark, is everything I was hoping for: a super eerie and freaky scene that lives up to the Backrooms’ weirdness.

  While this movie was fun, it was far from the scariest movie I’ve ever seen. The very next day, I saw Obsession, which may take the cake for the most scared a movie has ever made me.